


when i think about you i forget about my hands

by whatkindofnameisella



Series: Widojest Week 2020 [3]
Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Mutual Pining, Pining, Second Person, Stargazing, Widojest Week 2020, chloe moriondo thank you for your songs which i will take and apply to widojest and feel things, hand holding, this title may come from small but i listened to luv note and out came this idea
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-09
Updated: 2020-07-09
Packaged: 2021-03-04 18:00:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,989
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25170511
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whatkindofnameisella/pseuds/whatkindofnameisella
Summary: “Holy shit, Caleb – “ She stops where she’s walking besides you to look up at the sky and let out a gasp, “Look at the stars.”“What – “ You start, but her hand has already fiercely grasped your forearm and is pulling you down into the grass.(widojest week day 4 - paint/soot covered fingers)
Relationships: Jester Lavorre/Caleb Widogast
Series: Widojest Week 2020 [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1825060
Comments: 4
Kudos: 30
Collections: Widojest Week 2020





	when i think about you i forget about my hands

**Author's Note:**

> title from "small" by chloe moriondo (a top notch widojest song)

“Holy shit, Caleb – “ She stops where she’s walking besides you to look up at the sky and let out a gasp, “Look at the stars.”

“What – “ You start, but her hand has already fiercely grasped your forearm and is pulling you down into the grass. It’s slightly damp, you realize, as you tumble down beside her, the sound of crickets and frogs gentle in the distance, and she already looks comfortable, grinning wide-eyed on her back at the stars. Your first impulse is to argue – your friends will be wondering where you are, and you do not want to have to sit through Beau chewing you out if you make her worried. Again.

She’s right, though. The stars are beautiful. Then she smiles at you and your heart twists so violently in your chest you give up on any hope of escape.

You let yourself settle into the grass as her hand slips off of your arm. You are painfully aware of how close she is, of how easy it would be to touch her. You instead clear your throat to settle the frogs hopping up from your stomach. “Don’t we see the stars all the time?”

“Yeah, but…” She sighs deep, like she is trying to take in the whole world in one breath, and there is something akin to reverence in her eyes when you turn your head to look at her. It makes your chest buzz with something long-forgotten and funny. “Not like this. Not for a long time.”

“We’re always camping, though.”

“We’re always in the dome,” she counters, “Or in a city.” She pauses. “And Rohsonna only has darkness, never stars.”

“That’s true.” You look back up and find yourself, against your better judgement, on the edge of a smile. “Never stars.”

There’s a pause.

“I never really got to see stars at the Chateau, either.”

You turn your head. “Really?”

“Nope,” she smacks her lips, too content for talking of a childhood of confinement, “Always inside. And, you know, if I wasn’t, it was always pretty bright in the city.”

Something pangs inside your chest like it always does whenever she mentions her childhood. When you think about it, really, you both had them somewhat stolen away. She is still grinning lazily, though, like she has never thought twice about never being outside to see the stars, and you think that if you had one ounce of the confidence that seems to always be running through her, holding her up, staring you down since the day you met, an awful lot of your problems could be solved in an instant.

You swallow and look back up at the sky, clear your throat again. Those frogs just won’t stay put. “I have seen enough night skies for multiple lifetimes.”

Her head whips to face yours in the corner of your vision. You would not dare to meet her gaze for fear of doing something foolish like smiling back. Like touching her. “Really?” 

“ _Ja_ , really. I mean, when you live on a farm, you know…” You think of nights upon nights of home, of the view of the sky from your small bedroom window, the nights you sat bundled on your mother’s lap as she pressed her cheek to yours and connected the constellations with her finger. The moon had been exceptionally bright the night you had seen it burnt to ash, but – you breathe deep and remember where you are again. “Skies are always clear.” 

You can tell she’s still looking at you, not speaking, and it is eating you up inside to not know what she is thinking. You turn your head to look at her, and – oh, gods, she’s beautiful, you – you would pluck the stars out of the sky if she asked you to, if it would keep her looking at you a second longer. That funny thing buzzes in your chest, capricious and childish. Your fingers twitch.

“It’s – it’s, ah – “ You pause, because her eyes are the most beautiful thing you have ever seen in your entire life and you cannot look away, “It’s beautiful.”

“Yeah?” She holds your gaze and smirks, like she knows she has gotten you trapped, like she is overjoyed to have this simple moment with you in the dark. She is on the verge of a laugh, you know it from the way her nose is beginning to crinkle. Not that you’ve looked at her nose a lot.

“Um – _ja_ ,” you manage, riding on the smallest of breaths, and you feel like that funny thing is wrapping a chord in-between each one of your ribs, like it is going to pull and your ribcage is going to collapse. “Like nothing else.”

(It doesn’t seem such a selfish thing to reach out and hold her hand, to thread your fingers between the blue, run your thumb over each callous and ink stain until the soot is rubbed clean. Not right now. Not anymore.)

(Would it be?)

Her smile softens and something inside you breaks. “Maybe you can show me.” She pauses like she has touched something delicate before quickly adding on, “Someday.”

A silence settles and you stare at each other. It feels like you are breathing the same air, breath for stuttering breath. You want to show her, desperately, wish she could see every corner of that poor house, want to walk her along every inch of that farm and get lost in the flowers and grass. You would look at the stars, and press your cheek to hers as she giggled, and you would trace the constellations with your finger in the sky.

You would hold her hand, and you would kiss her, you would kiss her until she was sick of you, until her face was as smudged with charcoal as your fingertips, until – 

You are stuck on the sight of her in the dark like gravity, stuck on her stuck on you sheltered in the grass, and you are going to kiss her, you realize, you are going to – 

You are not, you are turning your head back to the sky and taking in the biggest gulp of cold night air your measly lungs can offer, you are pretending that the thought never even crossed your mind. You clear your throat again. Pesky frogs. “Maybe, _ja_.”

She is still looking at you, you can see out of the corner of your eye, and you want – her hand is right there, and sure you will probably die the moment you touch her, but your heart aches, your heart – this is not the place or time, it will never be. You are living on stolen breaths as it is. As stolen as the moment she first smiled at you, as stolen as the many times she has grabbed your hands.

You definitely do not watch out of the corner of your eye as she turns her head back up to the sky above you. There is definitely no pang, no suffocating constriction in your chest. She sighs. You steal one more glance at her. Everything that’s yours lately is stolen, it seems. Stolen and selfish, not meant for you, only in fleeting, mistaken moments –

It is the smallest thing, you can barely see it, but – her eyes meet yours, in the dark, and you feel like your heart has stopped beating inside your chest. You wouldn’t dream of breathing, wouldn’t chance looking away and loosing this moment – this stolen moment, this lovely, gracious moment – under the stars. Her hand is – right there, _right there_ , and you – 

You feel it as her finger crawls over your own, as her palm hovers and then settles over the top of your hand in the grass, as that feeling finally pulls the chord and your heart – breaks and blossoms, takes some merciful root in you, all at once. Your head drops to fully look at her of its own accord, catches the upturning of her lips as she begins to smile, becuase – you are such a fragile, lonely thing, finally coming alive for the second time, and – this is more than you ever deserve, but – you think you would like to stay here, holding her hand, forever. 

She breathes in one more time and you realize that her eyes are filled with as much terror as yours, get the feeling that her heart is doing the same petrified cartwheels in her chest – stumbling along, tripping over the stupid fragility of this moment, knocking into her ribcage – but gracefully so. Gracefully so. 

She bites her bottom lip in a smile, turns her head back up to the sky. “Beautiful, isn’t it?”

“ _J-ja_ ,” you barely manage to stutter out. You would not know, for you cannot take your eyes off of her. Your heart is still learning to exist inside your chest. This will end soon, somehow, and you don’t want it to, you don’t want – 

She sighs, quickly, turns her head to you and shows the barest beginnings of an unsure smile. The end of this. “We should get going back to camp, though.” She pushes off the ground, onto her knees, takes her hand off of yours as she stands tall and rocks back on her heels, gazing up at the sky. She turns around to you and offers her hand.

You are still flat on the ground, gazing up at her framed by what feels like the clearest sky you have ever seen, abundant with hundreds of stars. You would stay petrified in the grass forever but something in your chest is pulling you to her, up onto your knees, placing your hand in her palm as she tugs you to your feet. 

You come to your feet and pause, because – her hand is in yours and is starting to burn, and you are very close to her, and would it be such a bad thing if you leaned forward and just – caught her lips, quickly, just put one hand in her hair – 

She glances down quickly, pulls her hand away like you’re schoolchildren stealing moments in alcoves and not two stumbling adults barely able to hold hands in the grass. It is much easier to pretend you are the former than the latter. You have much more experience in that. You have no idea what this is, or how to handle the fumbling thuds your heart makes when she peers back up to you before turning around and beginning to walk back to camp.

You have half the mind to stumble after her, to try and think of how you will somehow act like a normal person after this. You couldn’t possibly – not when you can’t think of anything but wanting to hold her hand again. Not when your heart has finally taken root in you, when you know it is so utterly hers. When you get the feeling it has always been.

You fold your fingers in, hold your hand close to your chest, nursing the burns before looking up to the stars, _the stars_ – 

They are beautiful, and you would not have looked up to them had Jester Lavorre not stopped dead in front of you and pulled you to the grass, were you not so useless to the way she makes your heart skitter around your chest. And you wonder, watching her walk through the dark, pretending you are not staring at her when she turns and catches your eye, what it would be like to be so _hungry_ for the world, so hopeful again, and you do not think – not anymore, at least – that it would be such a bad thing. Like smiling. Like holding her hand. Like kissing her, but – 

There’s no room for that.

You stumble after her in the dark, hopeful and heartsick, barely able to see past your own two feet, trying and failing to get used to the feeling of your hand without hers in it again.

**Author's Note:**

> this fic originated all the way back in the days of widojest hiatus prompts in early april when I was very frustrated and listening to luv note by chloe moriondo and feeling things, and here it is for widojest week! wow. and cr tonight!!! praying to the dnd gods that laura bailey and liam Obrien did something that will make me loose my mind. happy day 4 :))) <333


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